D.B COOPER: AIR HOSTESS SPENT 10-YEARS IN NUNNERY

COOPER

MUCKLOW AT THE TIME

THE STRANGE case of mysterious skyjacker DB Cooper just took another bizarre twist when it was revealed that the stewardess who dealt with the thief, then spent 10-years in a nunnery - possibly as part of the witness protection programme.
Tina Mucklow was praised for her calm handling of the man, who called himself Dan Cooper, who in 1971, boarded the Seattle to Portland plane and claimed to have a bomb strapped to his chest. 
With as little fuss as possible, she served him drinks and passed messages between him and the pilot and then helped the passengers off the plane when it landed in Seattle. 
Then after he'd got his $200,000 ransom and forced the plane to take off again, she showed him how to operate the emergency door out of which he jumped. 
Hailed as a heroine at the time she told the World's media: "He seemed rather nice. He was never cruel or nasty. He was thoughtful and calm."
The pilot is said to claimed that the 22-year-old's actions in air saved the passengers' lives.
But while she may have had nerves of steel at the time, the media glare allegedly became too much for the overawed young witness, who stopped speaking to the media completely in about 1980.   
Then she entered the Maria Regina Convent, a Carmelite Catholic nunnery outside Eugene, Oregon, where she would have had to immerse herself in prayer and would rarely have been allowed to leave the grounds of the convent.
Strangely, she left after 12-years, something very unusual for Carmelite nuns.
When CNN contacted them to ask why she'd left after 12 years, the head sister said it was because she "no longer fit in."

Refusing to give her name she added that she "left in about 1991 or 1992. I'm not going to say any more about it."
She's now believed to be living a quiet life in Oregon under a different name but has co-operated with the ongoing DB Cooper investigation, FBI spokeswoman Ayn Sandalo Dietrich said.
Her role may, however, become more important than ever now after a woman came out to say she believed her uncle was DB Cooper.
She has now provided the FBI with a photograph of her uncle Lynne Doyle and a guitar strap which he owned for fingerprint testing.
The FBI said DNA found on the tie does not match - but refused to rule him out as a suspect.

Read more ...

D.B COOPER REMAINS A MYSTERY: DNA DOESN'T MATCH

MYSTERY

THE D.B Cooper Skyjacking case remains a mystery because the DNA samples they found on a tie do not match the latest in a long line of suspects, disappointed FBI agents have revealed. 
As we reported here, investigators had been hopeful of laying the case to rest after tip off from a fellow law enforcement official had pointed them towards another potential candidate for the brazen hijacking. 
But when they compared the DNA found on a tie with some taken from the suspect, it did not match. 
However, special Agent Fred Gutt said that the test does not necessarily rule out the now deceased suspect because there are three different DNA samples on it.
He added that it's possible it had been used previously by other people and the case which has baffled law enforcement officials for almost four decades continues.
Back in 1971, a man with a ticket in the name of Dan Cooper boarded the Northwest Orient Airlines 727 flight from Portland to Mexico via Reno and sat in seat 18F. 
Then, shortly after take off, the man believed to be in his mid forties ordered a bourbon and water. 
But when the flight attendant returned with his drink, he handed her a note saying: "Miss, I've got a bomb, come sit next to me — you're being hijacked."
He followed us his threat by opening a briefcase which appeared to contain explosives and demanded $200,000 and parachutes.
With little choice the authorities agreed and after landing the plane at Seattle Airport, he exchanged the terrified passengers and a couple of the flight crew for the ransom.
Then he demanded that the pilots take off and head for Mexico. 
About 40 minutes after takeoff, a signal light in the cockpit showed that the plane's rear stairway had been extended. 
When the jet landed in Reno, the stairs were down and two parachutes, the money and the mysterious Cooper were gone. 
There have been more than 1,000 suspects over the past four decades, but almost 40-years later the identity of the hijacker remains a mystery. 
Some have also speculated that he failed to survive the 10,000ft leap, especially after $5,800 worth of decomposed $20 bills, identified as part of the ransom money were recovered in 1980 by a child digging on the banks of the Columbia River near the Oregon border. 
But no body has ever been found and few other signs of his fate have been discovered.
However the FBI is refusing to give up and after launching a new blaze of publicity last year this latest suspect, who had not been identified before emerged. 
Forensic experts are continuing to search for more fingerprints or DNA on the dead man's effects to compare with items the hijacker left behind. 

Read more ...